7. I'm not sure I've seen a season more valuable than Donovan Winters' S48 since coming back to the league; indeed, I think I've actually never seen a season as valuable. There's been some better seasons in that time, S30 Cortez is something I will always stump for, but as far as "fitting every possible definition of MVP to a T"? I think this is it.
Let's start with the simple one: Is Winters the best QB season this year, the usual way people go about giving MVP in the real NFL? Yes, clearly and blatantly so. You don't even need to go into advanced stats to show that, just looking at the 7 point gap in passer rating to anyone else in the league and the 12 point gap in passer rating for anyone else with more volume is probably enough, but when you get into things like his yards per attempt and his ANY/A it becomes completely undeniable. He leads TANY/A (ANY/A adjusted for rush attempts and fumbles) by 1.3 yards over anyone else.
My personal judge for MVP is "best season regardless of position" and I feel like Winters, having a top 10-15 QB season all time, easily takes that. There's an argument for Justin Willis as a Linebacker but I don't feel like that has that much of a leg to stand on. You might say that Pitter Patter or Kadarius Claypool II have arguments looking just at their raw stats, but their advance stats betray them; you could easily make arguments that neither are even the 2nd best player at their position this season, and with Pitter Patter especially he's more a good player who had a bunch of targets; in terms of yards per target he's below the leaders at the position by 2.5 yards. Said leader, Sem'ga Nah'sim is just straight up a primary WR, this isn't a case of a low usage high efficiency guy skewing the results. Anyways, suffice to say Winters is the best player regardless of position this year.
Then there's the one that I see trotted out often, and I absolutely hate. "Did he carry his team?" This viewpoint often punishes players for being on good teams or for making teammates better. That being said, if you really want to go this route, Winters is probably one of the best MVP candidates of all time.
Arizona was not a particularly dominant team this year, outside of one particular stat. Sure, they had a good rush defense by yardage, but were the worst team in the league at pass defense, which led to an average defense both in terms of yards allowed and points against, 7th in the league in each. By pure yards, they had the 4th best rushing offense, but that came from being a great team up in a bunch of games. At 4.3, they were 9th in yards per carry, the worst of the top 4 offenses in the league by a significant distance. The Hawks, Crash, and Second Line were all up at 4.6 and 4.7 yards per carry. This wasn't the worst run game in the league by any metric (oh my goodness Fire Salamanders what were you doing) but it was at best average, and I'd call it below average.
But they had the most yards for of any team, and the most points for. They were the best offense, and this was entirely due to the strength of the passing attack. It's not even like any target stood out particularly; both Bamford and Benji were great, might make All Pro teams, but are way too spread out to be, say, on the ballot for OPOY/MVP. If Winters was more supported this season then Arizona would be the 1st seed overall and at bare minimum host the Conference Championship. Winters for MVP.
Let's start with the simple one: Is Winters the best QB season this year, the usual way people go about giving MVP in the real NFL? Yes, clearly and blatantly so. You don't even need to go into advanced stats to show that, just looking at the 7 point gap in passer rating to anyone else in the league and the 12 point gap in passer rating for anyone else with more volume is probably enough, but when you get into things like his yards per attempt and his ANY/A it becomes completely undeniable. He leads TANY/A (ANY/A adjusted for rush attempts and fumbles) by 1.3 yards over anyone else.
My personal judge for MVP is "best season regardless of position" and I feel like Winters, having a top 10-15 QB season all time, easily takes that. There's an argument for Justin Willis as a Linebacker but I don't feel like that has that much of a leg to stand on. You might say that Pitter Patter or Kadarius Claypool II have arguments looking just at their raw stats, but their advance stats betray them; you could easily make arguments that neither are even the 2nd best player at their position this season, and with Pitter Patter especially he's more a good player who had a bunch of targets; in terms of yards per target he's below the leaders at the position by 2.5 yards. Said leader, Sem'ga Nah'sim is just straight up a primary WR, this isn't a case of a low usage high efficiency guy skewing the results. Anyways, suffice to say Winters is the best player regardless of position this year.
Then there's the one that I see trotted out often, and I absolutely hate. "Did he carry his team?" This viewpoint often punishes players for being on good teams or for making teammates better. That being said, if you really want to go this route, Winters is probably one of the best MVP candidates of all time.
Arizona was not a particularly dominant team this year, outside of one particular stat. Sure, they had a good rush defense by yardage, but were the worst team in the league at pass defense, which led to an average defense both in terms of yards allowed and points against, 7th in the league in each. By pure yards, they had the 4th best rushing offense, but that came from being a great team up in a bunch of games. At 4.3, they were 9th in yards per carry, the worst of the top 4 offenses in the league by a significant distance. The Hawks, Crash, and Second Line were all up at 4.6 and 4.7 yards per carry. This wasn't the worst run game in the league by any metric (oh my goodness Fire Salamanders what were you doing) but it was at best average, and I'd call it below average.
But they had the most yards for of any team, and the most points for. They were the best offense, and this was entirely due to the strength of the passing attack. It's not even like any target stood out particularly; both Bamford and Benji were great, might make All Pro teams, but are way too spread out to be, say, on the ballot for OPOY/MVP. If Winters was more supported this season then Arizona would be the 1st seed overall and at bare minimum host the Conference Championship. Winters for MVP.